ICT351 software consultant is negotiating a contract with a local community

Software Consultant

A software consultant is negotiating a contract with a local community to design their traffic control system. He recommends they select the TCS system out of several available systems on the market. The consultant fails to mention that he is a major stockholder of the company producing TCS software.

Case 2:

Computer Science Course

Joe is working on a project for his computer science course. The instructor has allotted a fixed amount of computer time for this project. Joe has run out of time, but has not yet finished the project. The instructor cannot be reached. Last year Joe worked as a student programmer for the campus computer centre and is quite familiar with procedures to increase time allocations to accounts. Using what he learned last year, he is able to access the master account. Then he gives himself additional time and finishes his project.

Case 3:

Accounting Software

You have been asked to observe how junior management use new accounting software at a leading city accounting firm. As part of informed consent, staff are informed that they will remain anonymous. As part of your observations, you notice that many of the junior management staff are making a particular data entry error when using this software. These errors are causing the accountancy firm to lose profit. Company policy dictates clearly that workers’ salaries will be docked for clear mistakes leading to loss of company profit. Do you take the edge off the results to protect the people who helped you in the study?

Case 4:

Usability testing

An internal usability team wanted to perform a usability test on a web site using half internal and half external participants. Would the consent form designed for external users also be used for the internals? Some members of the usability team argued that the terms of employment were sufficient to require internals participate. Others argued that the purpose of ‘consent’ was to ensure that participants understood why they had been asked, what was going to happen, what data would be collected, how it would be used and that they were free to leave any time. Given that the company had paid for usability testing, and given that the employees had agreed to work for the company for payment, is the employee free to leave?

Doing Ethics Technique – Hints And Tips

The ‘Doing Ethics’ technique is a process for analysing ethical issues in any scenario. It doesn’t guarantee that what you come up with will be the best solution, but it does help you to think ethically. The technique may seem a little vague and perhaps lacking guidance, however the following might help you to understand how to apply the technique in order to better understand ethical analysis.

Q1. What’s Going On?

This is a synopsis of what the case is all about. It can be taken from a variety of perspectives, for example, from the perspective of a person raising a complaint, in which case, it is a synopsis of the complaint. It can be taken from the perspective of an involved observer, in which case, it is an outline of what was observed, without going into too much detail. Where you see multiple perspectives, you should describe them here.

Q2. What Are The Facts?

This is a descriptive list of the facts of the case. This doesn’t just describe the case; it lists the facts as they are known (from all sources and perspectives), and also what one might reasonably consider to be possibilities. For example, if a person was raising a complaint, Question 1 would outline their complaint, and Question 2 would provide the evidence to both support and refute that argument. All such facts must be demonstrable or supportable. It would be worthwhile to assign a credibility weighting to each fact, to help with later analysis.

Q3. What Are The Issues?

This is a list of ALL the issues that are involved in the case. In Question 5 we can extract only the ethical issues for further analysis, but for now, simply extract and describe every relevant issue you can think of.

Q4. Who Is Affected?

This is a list of all the stakeholders involved in the case. This need not be restricted to the ones specifically mentioned in the case; you should consider who/what else might be affected by the issues listed at Question 3, regardless of the degree to which they are affected. In this question, you should describe how each stakeholder is affected, both positively and negatively, and perhaps comment on the degree of effect.

Q5. What Are The Ethical Issues And Implications?

For this question, you need to extract only the ethical issues identified at Question 3. List the ethical issues, discuss them in terms of classical ethical theory (as best you can), and discuss their implications – on the stakeholders and on the community in general.

Q6. What Can Be Done About It?

This question elicits a general idea of what can be done to resolve the case, whether those ideas are practical, possible, or not. Generally what kind of resolutions might there be? You need not go into great detail to answer this question, as its purpose is to provide a basis for answering Question 7, but you do need to think broadly and laterally to come up with several alternatives.

Q7. What Are The Options?

This question requires that you list and describe (in detail) all the possible options that might be available to resolve the case. Be creative here; the most obvious options are not always the best. It’s possible that not all options will result in a positive outcome for all stakeholders.

List and describe at least three different options, and discuss the benefits and detriments of each.

Q8. Which Option Is Best – And Why?

In answering this question, you need to assess which of the options described in Question 7 is the best. You are recommending one of several options here, so you need to argue for your recommendation, providing a solid basis in fact and reasonable (and supportable) conjecture. You should add some of your own intellectual property, as an ICT professional, into answering this question. Supporting your argument based on classical ethical theory is not a requirement at this point, but it is what would be expected if you were a professional Ethicist.

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